Day 4: Dayville To John Day

All good things must come to an end, and that's exactly how this tour ended.  With all of us wanting a few days more, just a few more miles, just a few more hilarious nights filled with word games and stories.  Facing another blazing hot day, we were up by 5:30 am and rolled out before 7 am to beat the heat.  We had a fairly uninteresting flat 30 miles to cover from Dayville to John Day, which was made more interesting by bumping into a lovely couple bike touring to New York.  Turns out they were both from the Washington DC area and quit their jobs to bike...

Glamour shots while we waited for Ani to go back and retrieve the food she left in the fridge.

Home again, home again, jiggity jig jig.

There is a lovely sense of support and camaraderie that I can't put my finger on, but that certainly exists in a way with this group of women that I've never had when touring with guys.  That's not to say one is better than the other, but that it's just different and special.  And maybe it will never exist in this way again... except that I have a feeling this will not be our last bike tour together.

Day 3: Big Bend Campground To Dayville (Where Dreams Come True)

Although we intended to take our time getting up, I managed to find myself up and out of my tent by 5:30 am and caught the tail end of sunrise.  Kate was already up and making her morning tea.  This was going to be our hottest day with temperatures around 90 degrees and not a cloud in the sky so we were anxious to get on the road.  Alas, we ended up being a little too efficient and rolled by the store in Kimberly before it opened.  We had planned to fill our water up there, but decided to push on and filter from the John Day if need be (despite the assured presence of agricultural runoff).

So many cows out here.

Heading into the fossil beds.

Despite our best efforts to beat the heat, by the time we got into the fossil beds, it was sweltering.  Our half-mile "hike" had us sweating profusely and dreaming of a cold swim hole with shade and hammock trees.

Otherworldly... and hot.  But some cool fossil replicas and informational signs.

Even hotter was trying to hike up to an overlook.

We found some respite for lunch at the Cant Ranch just opposite the John Day Fossil Bed Visitors Center.  It had trees, manicured lawns, and a little picnic area close to the river.  Despite the allure of throwing up hammocks, we wanted to take some time to explore the visitors center and see if we could get some local intel on a good swimming hole.

We got a good parking spot!

Learning things.

Alas, the folks at the visitors center refused to help us.  The water levels were too high and they couldn't tell us anywhere to swim.  As we approached the hottest part of the day, we had to make a decision.  Settle for the less than stellar spot at the Cant Ranch that didn't really have a swim hole, or power through to Dayville and relax there.  Maybe there would be a swim hole, hammock trees, and kombucha!

Winding though the canyon.

We had made Dayville out to be some magical land of happiness... and well, it was.  It was quirky and its residents were welcoming with that edge that you only find in the wild west.  The city park had a swimming hole with crawfish and hammock trees.  The local market had craft beer and kombucha.  The Presbyterian church was a bike hostel with a real kitchen and hot showers.  Seriously, the magical land of cycle tourist happiness.

Waiting out the heat of the day.

Uh huuuh.

Happy hour in hammocks!

After jumping in the river and letting the hottest part of the day pass, Kate decided she would push onto John Day and then drive back to meet us.  Since she had to drive back to Portland, she wanted to beat the traffic getting back in.  We decided to be lazy for a little while longer, taught Michelle how to fix her first flat tire, and then went to check out the bike hostel at the Presbyterian church and get showers.  But first, we got some reading material for the night.

Checking out the amazing selection of books.

Yup, looks like it is going to be scintillating evening of reading for all of us.

We settled into the church, setting up camp and taking showers.  There were four other bike tourists there who had just started a cross-country tour.  We socialized a bit, welcomed Kate back, made dinner, and then went outside to do some acroyoga and host our own MST3K style reading of our Little Library books.  Which really ended up being a semi-dramatic/traumatic reading interspersed with gut busting laughter.  Let me tell you, the clear winner was actually the marriage of the Blackfoot Massacre and the Dinosaur with a Sword.  That is all.

Ani loves real kitchens!

Storytime after dinner (photo credit: Kate).

Day 2: Austin Junction-ish To Big Bend BLM Campground (aka Ouch!)

So normally, I am a pretty chill bike tourist.  I like to stop and smell the roses, do side hikes, dip my toes in the river, and otherwise, just take my time.  Sometimes, you live 4 lifetimes in a day and end up biking 84 miles under the blazing eastern Oregon sun.  Beautiful and brutal miles, to say the least.  We took our time getting out of camp since we had rolled in just before sunset the night before.

Morning riding and perfect temperatures (photo credit: Kate).

Me taking pictures of you taking pictures of me... I like to get low sometimes (photo credit: Kate).

The picture I actually took.

Remember that time we saved the baby fawn from uncertain death by barbed wire and I almost bit it climbing back down this steep hillside?

Snack break at the Galena "ghost town."  It was a little underwhelming, but amused us for about 5 minutes.

River, road, cliff.  Lather, rinse, repeat.

As the sun rose and the cool morning temperatures gave way to hot summer heat, we battled through the last cruddy climb of the trip.  Each summit seemed to have a road or path up to a lookout tower, so Ani and I took the opportunity to walk up and see what we could see.  Michelle and Kate hunkered under the shade of a tree and rested while we took our side trip.  Alas, the lookout tower was locked, so instead, we amused ourselves and did a bunch of handstands.

The world looks good upside down and surrounded by lupine.

And then finally, we descended into the most beautiful canyon.  It was an explosion of colorful rock formations and we forced ourselves to stop and enjoy the view despite our urge to just let go of the brakes.  As we took in the views of the valley, we saw a small speck working its way slowly up the hill.  Was it a bike tourist?  Was that a trailer he was pulling?

Somewhere down there is a speck of a cyclist.

Michelle gets some love from Fearless Fred!

We thought we were in the home stretch and that we would find camping just past Monument.  Whoops.  All that part along the John Day river that we thought might be National Forest was actually farms... so many &*%&$-ing farms.  "Worst case scenario, we are at the BLM campground," I said.

Rolling rolling rolling...

Michelle is still in good spirits.

And well, guess what?  We ended up at the BLM campground.  All the established sites were taken, so we found a flat spot where one of the other folks told us someone had camped the night before, pitched our tents, and then made a bee line for the river to wash the salt and road grit off ourselves.  Holy crap was that water cold and the most amazing thing of my life.

Our neighbors in the RV let us use their picnic table since they had their "dining room" inside.

Michelle may have bonked a little and got a little support from this tree and ginormous sweet potato during her recovery.

A few tips for cycle tourists:

• We could have easily camped at one of two RV sites in Monument.  The first one was actually on the river and not so bad, but all of us are morally opposed to places like that.  If I had been biking alone, I probably would have stopped and knocked on the door of one of the nicely manicured farmhouses and asked for permission to camp on their property.  That said, the Big Bend BLM campground has beautiful river access and it was pretty chill (all things considered) for Memorial Day weekend.

Day 1: John Day To Austin Junction-ish

Take one hard-fought winter, add a couple badass ladies who cycle, find a route taking the roads less travelled, and top it off with a holiday weekend... that, my friends, is how lifelong friends are born.  I biked about half of the Old West Scenic Bikeway last year and I was itching to go back to do the whole thing.  I've slowly gathered my tribe of bikepackers and bike tourers and so I was pleasantly surprised to wrangle my good friends Ani, Michelle, and Kate to join me on this tour.  This would be Kate's first fully loaded tour!

The pre-trip explosion of gear in the Kam Wah Cultural Center's parking lot (photo credit: Kate). 

We were surprisingly efficient in getting our gear loaded, bottles filled, and water in-water out.  About an hour after our meeting time, we slathered ourselves in sunscreen and set out to crush the first 30 miles and find somewhere to camp somewhere after the Austin Junction.

The Prairie City rest area overlooks the most scenic church in all the land.

We are kind of awesome... and happy to mostly be done climbing up this darn hill!

And as always, climbs are always worth it.  The Strawberry Mountains in all their glory.

And more climbing.

We reached the summit in good time, took a short break, donned some layers, and then went screaming down the other side of the mountain.  We coasted into the restaurant/mini-mart at the Austin Junction to use the restroom and fill water... until the hostess reminded me there was a lovely fresh water spring just a mile down the road.  A nice gentleman was filling jugs with water when we arrived and wished us well as we pulled out all our water bottles.

Michelle trying to make filling spring water look sexy.

By this time we were exhausted.  Michelle and I had worked a half day and then made the drive out before we started cycling.  We all agreed that we would stop at the first good camping we saw.  Of course, the first place we rolled by was every bike tourists nightmare... an RV park with concrete pads.  Hell no.  Tired legs or not, I was determined to find something more quiet and, well, RV-free.  And then it magically appeared.  A little two track trail just a mile past the RV park led to a gorgeous flat dispersed campsite next to a stream with a little waterfall.  There was a little rock fire pit and we were well off the road.  We quickly threw up our tents, donned long sleeves to deter the mosquitos, and made dinner before passing out.

Kate and Michelle ride down the trail into our campsite.

Success!

A few tips for cycle tourists:

• Everything you need to know about his route is on the Ride Oregon Ride site.  

• Once you hit the Austin junction, you are in National Forest land which means you can camp anywhere so long as you are 20 feet off the paved road.  It is worth it to bike past the Bates campground to find lovely free dispersed camping.  Also, Highway 20 is quiet and mostly car-free and truly a cyclist's dream!

Bikepacking Overnight: Deschutes River Railbed Trail

Recently I've been feeling the need to unplug from life and people and do some solo soul searching.  I don't know why, but I very rarely see women bike touring let along doing it by themselves.  While I've done plenty of solo mountain biking, hiking, and international traveling, I haven't done a ton of solo bike touring.  Since I'm getting ready to give a presentation introducing women to bike touring and bikepacking, I wanted to make sure that I had firsthand experience of all the beginner-friendly routes I am providing in the presentation.

The Deschutes River Trailbed Trail was highlighted by Oregon Bikepacking as the quintessential beginner bikepacking route, so I decided to make it a quick solo sub-24 bikepacking trip.  It did not disappoint.  While the terrain is about as easy as dirt road touring gets, the spring flowers were exploding in the canyon and everything glowed green in this usually brown desert landscape.  Even the weather gave me a break... I had encountered hail and torrential downpours on the drive up and stubbornly trusted the weather forecast which said it would only be "cloudy and windy." I managed not to get rained on at all and even had a few glorious stretches in the sun.

Non-motorized... just horses, bikes, and hikers with dogs allowed.

Clouds started to clear as I hit the trail.

This is basically a dirt road with railroad grades that follows the Lower Deschutes River.  It is mostly compacted dirt with some rocky bits that a front suspension would have smoothed out.  Overall, really lovely easy riding.  I had a fair amount of company in the form of hikers and backpackers, which thinned out around seven or eight miles in.  It wasn't until much later that I saw two other bikepackers.

So many wildflowers this time of year!

Crazy rock formations along the canyon.  I saw the rock formations most often broken in columns, but this section had a cool sunburst effect.

Memories of decades past when the railroad used to run on this side of the river.  This old railcar around mile five or six would make a good hideout if it rained.  I contemplated camping here but it was waaaay too early.

Pestered a nice hiker into taking a picture of me.

Not sure this lovely farmhouse will withstand the test of time.

Depending on the source you read, this trail runs about 17 or 19 miles one way.  So around mile 12, I decided to start looking for a nice spot to camp.  I wanted to spend the afternoon losing myself in a new book and just enjoying the solitude.  It wasn't too long until I found a nice flat spot right along the river.

Picture perfect home for the night.

Peaceful sounds of the river + whiskey + book + intermittent sun = my kind of Saturday afternoon.

A few hours later, I emerged from my book, made a simple dinner of soba noodles with mushrooms and seaweed, and snuggled into my tent.  I drifted off to sleep and had one of the best sleeps I've had in a very long time.  Dawn came early and the birds gently woke me up as the first light came over the canyon.

Morning view from my tent.

I watched the moon set as I drank my morning tea.

I was so cozy in my tent so I read a bit more of my book before getting out to pack up.

I took my time to pack up and roll out.  I chuckled as I passed by another campsite just half a mile down the road from mine... there was a sexy touring bike next to the tent, its occupant still snoozing.  Then a few more miles down, another bike tourist was towing his pup in a trailer back towards the trailhead.  I settled easily into the rhythm of working my way back to the trailhead and made it back in no time at all.

Beware plants poking holes into your tires.

A few tips for cycle tourists:

• This tour is a great one for beginner bikepackers and bike tourers.  No traffic.  Nearly impossible to get lost.  Hiking trails if you want to drop your bike and explore.  History.  The river.  Just enough folks around that you won't be alone if anything were to happen.

• I would never drink from this part of the Deschutes river... it has everything from agricultural runoff to whatever the heck we pollute it with from Bend on south (note: the Deschutes runs south to north).  I carried in all the water I needed... and more.  Since this route is flat, I only drank about one bottle on the bike each way and then had 2 liters for cooking dinner and breakfast.  Later in the year, when it is scorching here, those amounts could double.

• The overnight parking area is right at the entrance of the Deschutes River State Recreation Area, but the self-pay station is where you pay for campsites.  The trailhead is right off the overnight parking area.

• There are more luxurious campsites maintained by BLM with pit toilets in the first seven or so miles of the trail, but I wanted to get away from people.  These sites are also often used by rafting companies.  There is a map at the trailhead which marks where all the camping is, and where the ones where pit toilets are.  

• Bring extra bike tubes and/or a patch kit... I saw multiple warnings about the infamous puncture vine both in write-ups and on the trail.  I was lucky but also being aware of staying away from any pokey looking plants.

• The two best resources for planning are Oregon Bikepacking and TrailLink.